regladden Posted February 27, 2006 Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 I am running Windows XP and just purchased a 300 GB Onetouch II drive with both USB and Firewire connectivity -- I'm only interested in the Firewire capability. I've been looking through this forum and trying pretty much everything I know how to make this drive work with my system, and finally decided to post a message. I have tried installing and uninstalling it dozens of times, tried getting patches (okay, they call them "hotfixes") from Microsoft to fix the problem, tried updating the Retrospect Express software to 1.1, even called the Maxtor (no)helpline, all to no avail. I -really- hate to give up, but I'm about to take it back and go buy a Seagate ... but it's probably just a dumb "you didn't hold your jaw right" kind of problem, so I'm giving it more patience than it probably deserves. In any case, here's my symptoms. I install everything per the instructions. When I attach the drive, I hear the happy tones from Windows indicating it found new hardware, and eventually the Maxtor software comes up asking me to reformat the drive to NTFS. I click to do so, but it returns a failure to format. When I attempt to skip this step, the drive appears for a moment in "My Computer" but the second I try to get either OneTouch or Retrospect to actually do anything with it, Windows disables the device listed as "Maxtor Personal Storage Security" with a "Code 43" and the drive disappears from view. I can unplug it and plug it back in and it reappears in "My Computer", but when I double click on the drive icon, it sits there for a minute before getting disabled again. When I look at the drive information in "Disk Management", it shows up as being "healthy", formatted as FAT32. When I attempt to format the drive straight through Windows it will take about an hour reformatting, only to error out saying that it couldn't complete the format. I'm at a loss of what to do next. Unless I hear from somebody soon, this thing's going back to Best Buy ... and I'm off to Circuit City to buy the Seagate ... -Roy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted February 27, 2006 Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 If the drive doesn't format there must be something wrong with it physically. If Maxtor didn't catch on to that, well, that's kind of sad. I think returning it would probably be the best thing to do at this point. Don't waste time on an already lost cause. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
regladden Posted February 27, 2006 Author Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 Well, I already took it back and traded it in for a different one. At first, when I couldn't get it to work through Firewire, I plugged it in through the USB and it worked fine. I was even able to format it and started a backup (but it was going to take days to complete!). So, it seemed the drive was fine and it was something wrong with the Firewire functionality. So, I tried again on Firewire, attempting to reformat it again, and always had trouble. I even switched out the Firewire cable, and when I did that, I seemed to get a little further along (so there was something wrong with the wire! ah hah!). But one of my attempts to format was interrupted and I was afraid I'd damaged the drive, so I took it back and traded it in for a new one, hoping that my problems had been compounded by the bad Firewire cable the first time around. Nothing doing. It still doesn't work. It's very frustrating because the USB seemed to work fine (but it's too darn slow!). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted February 27, 2006 Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 Is this a firewire PCI card that you've added to the machine? If so there may be something wrong with that card, or it might not be seated correctly in the slot. You might try a USB2 PCI card rather than firewire if this continues to be a problem for you. Also, if you have any other firewire devices connected try running the format after disconnecting them to ensure minimal chance of communications issues on your firewire bus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
regladden Posted February 27, 2006 Author Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 Well, I wondered about the card itself, as well. So, I attached my digital camcorder and it did it's normal thing without even blinking, so I'm certain it's not the card. Any other ideas? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted February 27, 2006 Report Share Posted February 27, 2006 So the hard drive doesn't work via firewire, but the camcorder (or it's associated software) can transfer data without errors. But the hard drive has no problems on USB. That is rather curious. Have you checked the Windows event viewer to see if there are any more specific errors listed for the formatting failure? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paleolith Posted March 1, 2006 Report Share Posted March 1, 2006 IIRC, a camcorder uses a streaming protocol within Firewire. Though the physical media is common, the protocol is a distinctly different part of Firewire -- again IIRC Firewire is time-sliced to guarantee adequate throughput for things that require such a guarantee, including streaming video. (One of the big advantages of Firewire over USB.) So it's quite possible for something to be wrong with the data connection -- in the logic in the card, or even in the circuits in the card -- without affecting the video capabiity. The Maxtor disks are generally pretty good, so with two of them failing, I'd say it's pretty certain the problem is between the disk and your computer. (It sounds like you've done a good job testing, so I'd rule out PEBKAC too.) Foster's suggestion of adding a PCI card for USB2 or Firewire makes sense. Best Buy has an Adaptec combo USB2/Firewire PCI card though it's a bit high, $75. But if it works, then you'd know you had a bad card in your computer. Or you could try just a plain Firewire card for about half the price -- $44 for an Adaptec, a few dollars less for Dynex (I'd go for the Adaptec -- I have an Adaptec combo PC card in my laptop and it's worked great). Or if you have time, I found a similar combo card for under $40 using Pricegrabber (searched for Adaptec PCI USB Firewire). Of course the advantage to buying from Best Buy is the ease of return if it doesn't improve your situation, so despite BB's somewhat higher prices for hardware it's often worth buying from them. Good luck, I know this kind of thing is a [censored]. Edward Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonb Posted March 3, 2006 Report Share Posted March 3, 2006 Man, these things are pesky! I, too, bought a OneTouch II a couple of weeks ago and I, too, am having the devil's own job getting it going on my PC. After trying most of the things described above by regladden (re-installing, patches, trying Express6 instead of HD etc ...) I took my little brother's advice (I don't often) and hooked the thing up to my wife's brand new laptop. Install Maxtor and Restrospect HD software, hit the 'go' button and voila! instant backup. So, it works on the wife's XPH machine but not on mine. Must be either a memory problem (but I have 1g) or a conflict somewhere - or a USB problem? Symptoms as above pretty-much - installs OK, starts OK, freezes the comp within minutes - restart only possible with the big red button. Picks up where it left off, adding restore points as it goes, goes another few minutes, freezes ... you get the picture. Any ideas anyone? Simon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted March 3, 2006 Report Share Posted March 3, 2006 Hi Simon, If the drive and the software work fine on another computer, you should take a closer look at your machine. First, make sure you're not connecting the drive using a USB hub. Always have it connected directly to the computer. You could also try different ports on your machine (if you have them). Another test I would strongly recommend would be to run a backup to the internal drive. This will let you know rather quickly whether you're having usb problems at all, or if your problems could stem from something less obvious - like a bad stick of RAM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonb Posted March 5, 2006 Report Share Posted March 5, 2006 Thanks a lot for your help Foster I finished my first backup this morning after about ten re-starts, but I figured if I could get it all on there then the incremental daily backups will more than likely go smothly. Only time will tell, I guess. My OneTouch is indeed plugged directly into the USB2 card and I have tried all three ports on that. I will try a backup to an internal drive - good idea. Cheers Simon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richG Posted March 10, 2006 Report Share Posted March 10, 2006 Hi, I'm unable to get Retrospect Express to do anything. When I start it up I get the Maxtor branded window informing me that the status is being updated but that's it. No matter how long I leave it nothing changes. The Setup button is active but nothing happens when I click on it. I can check my maxtor drive (Diagnostics shows no problems) using the one touch software but as soon as I click the setup and restore button the window disappears and Retrospect Express fails to start. Everything works fine when I plug the maxtor drive into my laptop which has the same software so I guess there is something on my PC preventing Retrospect Express from functioning correctly. I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling but no change. Any pointers on what I could check would be very much appreciated. I'm using XP Pro SP2 and connecting via USB (no hub involved). Cheers Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nekr0phage Posted March 10, 2006 Report Share Posted March 10, 2006 Hi Richard, Here are a few KnowledgeBase articles on Updating Status: http://kb.dantz.com/article.asp?article=7927&p=2 http://kb.dantz.com/article.asp?article=8098&p=2 If the first one doesn't apply to you, go through the second one to try and resolve the issue and let us know how it goes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richG Posted March 14, 2006 Report Share Posted March 14, 2006 Hi Foster, Works fine now. The first article was applicable to me. Many thanks for your help Cheers Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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